


Action

by anr



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-03-07
Updated: 2004-03-07
Packaged: 2017-11-04 14:31:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/394902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anr/pseuds/anr
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even Mark, two years younger and in pre-school, doesn't ask for Daddy any more.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Action

**Author's Note:**

> pre-Stargate, post-Death Knell (7x16)

Sam Carter is five years old the first time her father goes away and doesn't come back.

It's summer, with long, hot, lazy days that all melt together. Indian and blistering; thunderstorms every evening and a furnace-like breeze that makes her popsicles drip down the back of her hand and her skin sweaty in the shade. Mark has just been toilet-trained and whines constantly; her mom never, ever seems to stop moving.

She misses her dad terribly, with his big, big hugs at bed time and the way he pats her on the head every time she tells him something new. Things like how the dog next door is having puppies and it takes a snail four hours to cross the width of their driveway. Caterpillar is spelt c-a-t-e-r-p-i-l-l-a-r and deciduous means the tree in their front yard will lose its leaves in the fall.

He misses Christmas and her first day at school and her birthday. In June, Mickey Dodson tells her that his father says her father is dead so she calls him a liar and pushes him off the swings, breaking his arm. Her mom cries when Sam tries to explain and doesn't stop, even when Sam says she's sorry.

That summer her Uncle Irving comes to stay. It isn't as hot as the previous year and Uncle Irving calls her and Mark funny names and pulls quarters out of their ears. Mark laughs every time but when Sam asks how he does it, Uncle Irving says _magic_. She's not sure she believes him.

No one mentions her dad and, after awhile, her mom stops crying all the time. Sometimes, though, Sam stares at his picture and wonders where he is and whether Mickey Dodson is right.

She hopes he isn't.

In the fall she never seems to have enough to do at school and she starts asking her teacher for extra homework. Lucy Roberts calls her the teacher's pet and she's careful not to tell her mom how much the nickname hurts. She doesn't want her to start crying again.

At the beginning of December she dutifully writes a letter to Santa (even though she's beginning to think he doesn't exist) and asks politely for a big girl bike. What she really wants is for her father to come home but if her mom can't do that, no one can. Not even Santa.

Even Mark, two years younger and in pre-school, doesn't ask for Daddy any more.

The week before Christmas she sneaks into her mom's bedroom and goes looking for presents. She finds none under the bed but on the shelf in the wardrobe there's a shoebox full of letters. Most of them have her dad's name on the front and the words 'return to sender' stamped across the top. The last one, however, is to her mom.

That night she writes a letter to her dad and tells him how much she's missed him and that it was really silly of him to get so lost. She draws him a map, with arrows pointing to their house, to help him get back home. If he gets lost or missing again on the way, she says, she could meet him at the bus stop--he'll just have to call first 'cause she might be at school.

On the envelope she carefully prints out:

COL. J. CARTER ACTION

and thinks it's rather mean of her mom to have not said that she's known where her dad is all this time. When her mom asks her what she's writing, she lies and says, _nothing_.

She tries not to feel bad about that. Her mom lied first.

She posts the letter on her last day of school and brings home a bag full of work to do over the vacation. Mrs Watson has started giving her third grade homework and right now that means learning about the solar system (which is very cool). She thinks she'd like to be astronaut when she grows up.

Or maybe a nurse.

For Christmas Santa brings her the _Walk Lively Miss America_ Barbie and clothes and a collection of Dr Seuss books. Her mom says she'll read one of them to her later and Sam nods even though she read those books in kindergarten and now likes Nancy Drew. (Technically they're too old for her but, then again, so's long division.)

On her seventh birthday she gets a pogo stick and a party dress. It's pink and satiny and very, very pretty. Even though she'd asked for a big girl bike (again), she likes to drape herself in mom's lace curtains sometimes and pretend she's a princess. She imagines Mickey Dodson seeing her all dressed up and telling her she looks nice.

Then her mom tells her off for messing with the drapes and she remembers that Mickey's still sore about when she pushed him and he broke his arm. Boys are weird like that.

Her dad never calls.

In '73 her mom sends her and Mark to their grandparents for summer vacation. Grandma decides to teach her how to cook but she's not very good at it and would much rather be reading or playing outside. She thinks it's unfair that Grandpa's teaching Mark how to ride a big boy bike even though he's only five and she's been wanting to learn that for forever now. Sometimes, being the girl sucks.

Her mom calls every day and tells her how much she loves her and that she hopes Sam's being good for Grandma and Grandpa. She is, of course, but her mom always asks to speak to Mark before Sam can say so and she never, ever gets the chance to ask if anyone's called for her.

She wonders if her dad's lost their phone number too, and decides to write him another letter. But its summer's end before she can get away from Grandma and Grandpa long enough to post it and the next day Uncle Irving arrives to take her and Mark home. When she asks why their mom didn't come and get them, Uncle Irving says it's a surprise and she thinks she knows what that surprise is but doesn't want to get her hopes up.

Mark thinks it means they're getting a dog and she's careful not to tell him what she thinks because Uncle Irving is not going the right way. She asks him if he's lost and he lies and says he isn't but Sam has known where she lives for a long time now and this is not the way home.

The driveway Uncle Irving parks the car in has brown diamonds in it and there are blue shutters on the front of the house. There's no tree in the front yard. When she tells him he's made a mistake he just grabs their bags and laughs like she's said something funny. Mark looks a little scared so she takes his hand as they follow Uncle Irving along a strange path and up strange stairs and into this strange house.

Their mom is in a yellow and white kitchen and she smiles and hugs them tightly when they walk in. Mark asks where the dog is and Sam doesn't say anything because she can see their kitchen table and chairs and fridge and she knows, suddenly, that this isn't a strange house. This is their house. They've moved.

Her dad will never find them now.

She and Mark have to go to a new school here but she doesn't mind so much. On the first day she moves up a grade and at the end of the week, skips another one too. Mr Jenkins is making them learn all about the Civil War and she definitely wants to be a nurse now.

Or maybe a rock star.

Her mom goes out every day and doesn't get home until dinner time, but Uncle Irving is still there and he can make a pretty good PB and J so it's no big deal. On Saturday's he takes her to the afternoon matinees in town and she gets to see movies like _Invaders From Mars_ and _Earth vs The Flying Saucers_. Some of the aliens are kind of silly (and maybe a little scary) but she likes their ray guns. Those are cool.

They've been in their new house almost a month when mom comes home early one day and brings someone with her. He's kind of tall and has a cane like old Mrs Wilson who lives down the road from Grandma and Grandpa but he looks a little like Uncle Joe who she hasn't seen since she was a baby but who always sends her five dollars on her birthday.

Mark's holding her hand and his fingers are sticky.

Their mom says, _don't you remember your daddy?_ and Sam wants to say that she does and that this man isn't him. Her dad has more hair on his head and less on his face. Her dad doesn't look this old.

Uncle Irving says, _surprise bubbelahs!_ and Mark starts to cry.

Things change after that. Uncle Irving leaves and their mom stays home all day again. The man also stays.

Mark won't go near him and cries when mom tries to make him. When it's her turn Sam doesn't cry, but she watches him real carefully. He doesn't look like her dad but sometimes, if she listens awfully hard, she thinks he might sound a little like him.

There's not a lot of kids their age on Base here so Sam spends a lot of time playing with Mark and together they make up stories about aliens and monsters and bad guys from outer space. Mark has a Major Matt Mason doll and Major Matt can always save the day. Sam thinks that maybe she does want to be an astronaut, after all.

In the fall she starts saving up for a big girl bike. Her mom's already promised her fifty cents a week if she keeps her room clean and rakes up the leaves in the backyard. The man always helps her put the rake away when she's finished.

One day she tells him, _you'd look more like our dad without the moustache,_ and the man looks awfully surprised. Sam thinks that maybe he doesn't know that Mark thinks he's an alien just pretending to be their dad. Or that, sometimes, she thinks that too.

Two days later, when she wakes up, her dad's sitting in the kitchen, drinking coffee. He looks just like she remembered.

Sam says, _I'm glad you got my letters,_ and her dad smiles and pats her on the head.

  


* * *

  


Sam Carter is thirty-eight when her father goes away again.

It's summer.

  


* * *

The End

**Author's Note:**

> ORIGINAL URL: <http://anr.livejournal.com/118160.html>


End file.
